Israel-Hamas war, Day 49 live updates | Gaza cease-fire to begin Friday morning, aid to follow soon, says Qatar

Ambulances arrived at Hatzerim military air base in southern Israel on Friday, hours before hostages were expected to arrive after being released from Hamas captivity in the Gaza Strip.

Israeli officials said that after arriving at the air base escorted by Israeli soldiers, the released hostages will be flown or driven to five different hospitals across the country for medical treatment, as needed.

AP

Israeli forces shot and killed a 12-year-old Palestinian boy in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian health officials said Friday, as violence surges in the territory under the shadow of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.

The boy was killed Thursday in the village of Beita near the flashpoint city of Nablus in the northern West Bank, the officials said.

The Israeli military said Palestinians threw stones when soldiers entered the village and that troops responded with live fire. The military said it was looking into the circumstances of the boy’s death.

AP

Israeli troops fatally shot two Palestinians and wounded 11 others as they headed toward the main combat zone in northern Gaza despite warnings by the Israeli army to stay put.

An Associated Press journalist saw the two bodies and the wounded as they arrived at a hospital in the town of Deir al-Balah in the southern half of Gaza. The injured had been shot in the legs.

AP

The Israeli military has warned hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians who sought refuge in southern Gaza not to attempt to return to their homes in the northern half of the territory, the focus of Israel’s ground offensive.

Arabic-language leaflets dropped Friday over southern Gaza said that “the war has not ended yet” and people should remain in place.

“Returning to the north is prohibited and very dangerous,” the leaflets said. “Your fate and the fate of your families is in your hands. We have warned you.”

AP

The Israeli military said Friday it has destroyed stretches of tunnels and a number of tunnel shafts in the area of Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest.

On Thursday, Israeli military spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said Israel mapped out Shifa Hospital and plans to destroy all “terror infrastructure” it has found.

Separately, the military said it continued to strike targets throughout the night leading up to a four-day truce that began Friday morning. It said it “completed its operational preparations according to the combat lines of the pause.”

AP

Calm returned to Lebanon’s southern border Friday as a temporary truce took effect in the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, according to state media, residents and an AFP journalist.

An AFP journalist in the Marjayoun border region said he had heard exchanges of fire 10 minutes prior to the truce, before the guns fell silent.

A resident in the Alma al-Shaab border region also said the situation was calm and that he could no longer hear Israeli planes or reconnaissance drones flying overhead.

AFP

srael announced that four tankers with fuel and four tankers with cooking gas entered the Gaza Strip on Friday, the first day of what is meant to be a four-day cease-fire.

Israel has agreed to allow the delivery of 130,000 liters (34,300 gallons) of fuel a day into besieged Gaza for humanitarian needs for the duration of the truce. This would be roughly twice the amount permitted previously, but still only a small portion of Gaza’s daily needs, estimated at more than 1 million liters (264,000 gallons).

AP

Israel will on Friday release 39 Palestinians prisoners, among them 24 women and 15 teenaged males, in the occupied West Bank in exchange for 13 hostages due to be freed from the Gaza Strip by Hamas, a Palestinian official said.

The inmates, all of them from the occupied West Bank or Jerusalem, will be handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross at Israel’s Ofer military jail around 4 p.m. (1400 GMT), said Qadura Fares, Palestinian commissioner for prisoners.

That would coincide with the planned handover at the Gaza-Egypt border of 13 women and children who were among some 240 people taken hostage by Hamas gunmen during a deadly Oct. 7 rampage in southern Israel.

Reuters

Both sides will release women and children first. Israel said the truce would be extended an extra day for every additional 10 hostages freed.

The first 50 hostages being released are Israeli citizens, including some who have a second nationality, according to a Hamas official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the details with the media.

A first group of 13 women and children held by Hamas will be freed Friday afternoon, according to Majed al-Ansari, the spokesman of the Qatari foreign ministry. Three Palestinian prisoners, also women and minors, are to be released for every freed hostage.

Israel’s Justice Ministry published a list of 300 prisoners eligible to be released, mainly teenagers detained over the past year for rock-throwing and other minor offenses.

AP

France and China should work together to reduce global tensions and address issues such as climate change and biodiversity, French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna said on Friday.

Colonna was on an official trip to Beijing ahead of a major UN climate conference starting next week in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and an EU-China leaders meeting next month. Her visit coincided with the start of a four-day truce in the Israel-Hamas war.

Today’s tensions range from the wars in Gaza and Ukraine to the competition between China and the YS over trade, technology and security.

A delegation of Arab foreign ministers held talks in China and France in recent days as part of a series of meetings with permanent members of the UN Security Council to push for a cease-fire in Gaza.

AP

Britain will provide another 30 million pounds ($37.38 million)of humanitarian aid to Gaza, Foreign Secretary David Cameron said on Friday as he travels to the occupied Palestinian territories on the second day of his visit to the region.

Cameron will meet Palestinian leaders and aid agencies.

“We are hopeful that today will see the release of hostages, and I am urging all parties to continue to work towards the release of every hostage. A pause will also allow access for life-saving aid to the people of Gaza,” Cameron said in a statement.

Reuters

The number of antisemitic and anti-Muslim hate crimes in Toronto, Canada’s largest city, has spiked significantly since the start of the Gaza conflict between Israel and Hamas on Oct. 7, authorities said on Friday.

Police chief Myron Demkiw said 78 hate crimes had been reported between Oct. 7 and Nov. 20, compared to 37 in the same time frame in 2022. The real number was undoubtedly higher since some people were hesitant to come forward, he added.

The number of reported antisemitic hate crimes in this period almost trebled to 38 from 13 last year, while those involving the Muslim, Palestinian and Arab population leapt to 17 from just one in 2022.

“The impact of the events in the Middle East on our city are ongoing and have escalated since Oct. 7,” Demkiw told a televised news conference.

Reuters

Aid trucks were entering the Gaza Strip from Egypt on Friday, around 1-1/2 hours after a truce began between Israel and Palestinian Hamas fighters, Reuters TV footage showed.

Two of the trucks, representing Egyptian organisations, sported banners that said, “Together for Humanity.” Another said: “For our brothers in Gaza.”

Reuters

The Iran-backed Hezbollah group on Thursday intensified its attacks on Israel from southern Lebanon where Israeli bombardments killed seven of its fighters, including members of an elite unit.

Since the Israel-Hamas war began on October 7, the border between Lebanon and Israel has witnessed escalating exchanges of fire, primarily involving Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement, along with Palestinian groups.

The clashes have raised fears of a broader conflagration.

Hezbollah said it carried out more than 20 attacks on Israeli military positions and claimed to have caused casualties.

AFP

Business tycoon Elon Musk is expected to be in Israel next week, during which he will visit towns near the Gaza border that were attacked by Hamas on October 7, The Jerusalem Post reported citing Hebrew broadcast channel N12.

According to the report, Musk will meet with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his visit.

Musk has come under increasing fire in recent weeks for supposed failures to combat antisemitism on the social media site X, formerly Twitter, which the entrepreneur bought in April 2022, The Jerusalem Post has reported.

ANI

Aid trucks were entering the Gaza Strip from Egypt on Friday, around 1-1/2 hours after a truce began between Israel and Palestinian Hamas fighters, Reuters TV footage showed.

Two of the trucks, representing Egyptian organisations, sported banners that said, “Together for Humanity.” Another said: “For our brothers in Gaza.”

Reuters

There were no major reports of bombings, artillery strikes or rocket attacks as Israel and Hamas started a four-day ceasefire in Gaza on Friday, the first pause in a 48-day-old war that has devastated the Palestinian enclave.

The truce began at 7 a.m. (0500 GMT), involving a comprehensive ceasefire in north and south Gaza, the release of 13 Israeli women and child hostages by the militants later in the day and aid to flow into the besieged territory. A number of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli prisons were to be freed in exchange.

Reuters

The Israeli military has warned hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians who sought refuge in southern Gaza not to attempt to return to their homes in the northern half of the territory, the focus of Israel’s ground offensive.

Arabic-language leaflets dropped Friday over southern Gaza said that “the war has not ended yet” and people should remain in place.

“Returning to the north is prohibited and very dangerous,” the leaflets said. “Your fate and the fate of your families is in your hands. We have warned you.”

AP

A four-day truce in the Israel-Hamas war took effect on Friday, with hostages set to be released in exchange for prisoners in the first major reprieve in seven weeks of war that have claimed thousands of lives.

Starting from 7:00 am (0500 GMT), the pause was set to silence guns and stop bombings in a conflict that erupted after Hamas’s murderous raids into Israel on October 7.

AFP

At least 50 hostages are expected to be released over the four days.

Teams of Israeli trauma experts and medics will await them — along with specially trained soldiers who, according to guidelines, will promise to keep them safe and carry a child’s favourite food item, be it pizza or chicken schnitzel.

AFP has confirmed the identities of 210 of the roughly 240 people abducted during cross-border attacks by Hamas on military posts, communities and a desert music festival.

At least 35 of those taken hostage were children, with 18 of them aged 10 or under at the time of the Hamas attack.

Little is publicly known about the conditions the hostages have been held in.

AFP

A four-day truce in the Israel-Hamas war was set to start Friday with hostages to be released in exchange for prisoners, the first major reprieve in seven weeks of conflict that have claimed thousands of lives.

After prolonged negotiations, deliberations and delay, the pause was due to begin at 7:00 am (0500 GMT), silencing guns that have raged since Hamas’s murderous raids into Israel on October 7.

The start of the truce is set to be followed by the release of a first group of 13 hostages being held in Gaza, and an undefined number of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails, according to Qatari peacebrokers.

For Gaza’s two million-plus residents, the deal spells a respite from relentless Israeli bombardments, which the strip’s Hamas government says have killed about 15,000 people and displaced countless more.

AFP

Additional aid would start flowing into Gaza and the first hostages including elderly women would be freed at 4 p.m. (1400 GMT), with the total number rising to 50 over the four days, Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesperson Majed Al-Ansari said in Doha.

The inter-ministerial tender committee led by the Ministry of Communications decided on a quick mechanism for transferring payments from the incentive fund to companies operating in the combat zones and in the rest of the country as part of the first incentive tender to expand high-speed fibre optic cables to many more communities.

The incentive tenders are a key tool in encouraging the market to expand the deployment of fibre and provide services over it in general across the country, and in particular in areas where Bezeq chose not to deploy optical fibres for reasons of economic viability. The incentive areas include dozens of settlements and hundreds of thousands of households, including many households in the border areas.

So far, about 2.4 million households in Israel have had access to fiber-optic cables.

ANI

Israel and Hamas start a four-day truce on Friday morning with the militants to release a first group of 13 Israeli women and child hostages later in the day, the first break in a war that has devastated the besieged Gaza enclave.

The truce is due to begin at 7 a.m. (0500 GMT) and involve a comprehensive ceasefire in north and south Gaza, followed by the release of some of the more than 200 hostages taken by Hamas during the Iran-backed Islamists’ Oct. 7 attack inside Israel, mediators in Qatar said.

Reuters